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We’re a Janeite and we’re proud, say it out and say it loud

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Linda Troost is interviewed by KPBS on the monster mash-ups. Most of it is stuff you’ve heard before if you’ve been paying attention, but we must object to a bit at the end:

Well Jane Austen has been an object of adoration for quite a long time. In the very, very early 20th century, there were – she was prescribed reading for shell shocked World War I soldiers and I think partly because of that she became very, very dear to a great many people’s hearts. And, in fact, Rudyard Kipling wrote a story in 1920 called “The Janeites,” which is about a group of World War I soldiers who name all of their guns and cannons after Jane Austen characters and they actually used Jane Austen’s plots as sort of a secret code amongst themselves. It’s particularly funny because the person telling the story is a heavy Cockney and so we’ve got this whole thing being done in Cockney accent. But the term Janeite then gets applied to people who are sort of, you know, up – they’re like Trekkies only for Jane Austen…

CAVANAUGH: Right.

DR. TROOST: …and we still have them with us. And the movies have, I think, made a lot more Janeites.

CAVANAUGH: Yes, but does our obsession with Jane Austen tell us anything about our own culture?

DR. TROOST: Oh, I think a lot of us are very, very escapist. The Jane Austen that the Janeites are interested in is the Jane Austen of the rolling English countryside, its green and pleasant land. The pretty dresses, and the men with their elegant manners. That’s what a lot of people want, that kind of restrained, tasteful, classical, cultured world. That’s not necessarily the Jane Austen that the academic scholar sees, though. What they see there is the person deeply critical of her own society, the roles of women, the roles of men, the power that money plays over people’s lives, the hypocrisy that lies underneath the – a seemingly polished and elegant world. It’s really two different Jane Austens. But Jane Austen can accommodate both of them just perfectly.

Newsflash: Many of us who call ourselves Janeites may not have a lot of initials after our names, and we may enjoy the “green and pleasant land” of England (it’s a very pretty place) and pretty dresses and such, but that doesn’t mean we are incapable of seeing “the person deeply critical of her own society, the roles of women, the roles of men, the power that money plays over people’s lives, the hypocrisy that lies underneath the – a seemingly polished and elegant world.” And many of us bought your stinking book, too. *fondles Cluebat lovingly*

48 thoughts on “We’re a Janeite and we’re proud, say it out and say it loud”

It’s more complicated than Troost suggests in both directions. First, there are lots of Austen scholars who, for all their diligent attention to the dark side of Austen’s novels, nonetheless miss the boat in terms of the mysteries and puzzles which are omnipresent in the Austen novels. However, anyone who takes a turn through all the online discussions about Jane Austen will immediately notice that the overwhelming majority of Janeites are SOLELY interested in a romantic reading of the novels, and have zero interest in the rest of the “iceberg”.

The recent proliferation of film adaptations which have the most attenuated connection to the text of the novels themselves (the 2005 P&P, the 2007 Persuasion and 2007 MP, and the 2009 Emma being the prime examples), have only exacerbated this trend, as a whole new generation of Janeites has emerged who have never read any of the novels, and whose knowledge of Austen is confined to those adaptations, plus reading fanfic.

While I agree with Arnie that the majority of new Jane Austen fans are drawn to the romantic side of her stories, the young members of my particular Janeite group show a depth of knowledge about literature and history that enliven our discussions. These young women are less interested in the romantic elements of the plot and more intrigued by how constrained the lives of women were. In our group, at least, we touch on the Industrial Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, the consequences of poverty on the lives of individuals, the enclosure of the lands that forced so many to migrate from the countryside to the cities, and other matters that help us to understand the context of the world in which Jane’s novel are set. My young friends might be the exception, but I believe there are more of these serious students than Troost suspects.

*raises hand* Seeing as I’m only a freshman in college, I certainly don’t have a lot of initials after my name, and I’m certainly not a Jane fan for the pretty dresses. Actually, I could care less about the pretty dresses. I’m here for the great plotting and the excellent dialogue and the well-defined characters. I love the themes and the fact that even if her works do have the same themes, they’re all done in different ways. Yes, I’m drawn to the romantic side of the stories; wouldn’t anybody be? But I appreciate the books as more than that. I love literature and just because I’m also here for the love story doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate the literary value of the work, too. 🙂

I second what Trai said–why must enjoying the novels’ love stories and appreciating their literary merit be mutually exclusive? I love her commentary on the society around her that still rings true today. And then, as a bonus, her main characters get happily ever afters. Why can’t I enjoy both sides of her writing?

And I’m so tired of everyone assuming that people who like Austen could only possibly do so because they love the romance and they fantasize about attending a ball and they drool over wet Colin Firth. There are certainly are quite a few who fit that description, but there are quite a few who don’t. I know a large number of them, in fact. If Dr. Troost is going to make unfounded, sweeping generalizations about Janeites, then I’m going to make one about her: she’s completely out of touch with the people she insists on commenting about.

“I second what Trai said–why must enjoying the novels’ love stories and appreciating their literary merit be mutually exclusive? I love her commentary on the society around her that still rings true today. And then, as a bonus, her main characters get happily ever afters. Why can’t I enjoy both sides of her writing?”

I also think Jane Austen intended readers to appreciate both sides of her writing–but I do believe that the majority of Janeites out there today do only appreciate the romance. And I think Troost, in an uncareful way, was saying that.

The dark side of Austen’s novels is very dark, in the sense of its being an extremely strong critique of the horribly and unfairly weak position that women were forced into in her world. Most Janeites are unaware of that side of her novels, and many of them don’t want to hear about it.

I’m another of those fans who don’t see Jane Austen as a Romance Novelist, but as a great satirist who happened to create some wonderful romances. I know there are plenty of fans who disagree, though, and I don’t see how Dr Troost can lump all Jane Austen enthusiasts into one big “Janeite” pigeonhole. She made me think of the old “ivory tower” myth about academia when she said, “We tend to think of the film adaptations as being very, very faithful”. Huh? She sure hasn’t been following THIS blog!

(BTW I want to thank AustenBlog for the way you stick up for the idea that the adaptations SHOULD be faithful. I’ve been scolded for feeling that way, & sometimes when I get the me-against-the-world feeling, I think of the Cluebat and feel less alone. Keep on swingin’, ladies! It means a lot. Plus it’s my kind of humor, too.)

Arnie@#1: “…as a whole new generation of Janeites has emerged who have never read any of the novels, and whose knowledge of Austen is confined to those adaptations, plus reading fanfic…”

Please explain to me how people who haven’t read Austen’s novels can possibly considered Janeites. Even those high-brow folks who use the term as one of opprobrium expect that we unwashed savages READ. The films and fanfic tell us a whole lot more about the people who produced them than they do about Austen and her work. One really hasn’t got a lot to say about books one hasn’t read. Do those folks *think* they know Austen? Yeah, maybe. But what they really know is what Joe Wright, Deborah Moggach, and company think Austen means. Should they make the effort to learn more? Yeah, maybe. If they really care. But then they read the books and develop their understanding over time. Kinda like the rest of us…. But a casual fan is always just a casual fan.

Sandra, my observation, based on reading a lot of stuff that gets posted on the Net relating to JA, is that there are a lot of people, almost all girls and young women, whose familiarity with Jane Austen comes 80% or more from either watching one or more of the film adaptations (and in particular the dumbed-down ones which are most distant from the novels themselves, which for me means, the 2005 P&P, 2007 Persuasion, 2007 MP, and 2009 Emma), and the rest, if any, comes from reading parts or all of some of the novels. But it seems clear that they have little or no interest in close reading and serious discussion of the novels themselves, and where the JA-related reading they enjoy most is reading fanfics of JA, or romance novels inspired in some way by the Regency Era.

They themselves would consider themselves Janeites, and at this point, there are a very large number of them out there.

: an enthusiastic admirer of Jane Austen’s writings” (www.merriam-webster.com, April 12 2010) when one is completely unacquainted with them. The recent spate of films uses Austen’s characters and situations, but that doesn’t make it Austen. And JA-related paraliterature isn’t Austen either.

Note that I’m not arguing whether or not these people are less worthy of the right to read whatever the hell they want, however the hell they want, then those who prefer an academic (which is far more accurate than “serious”) reading and discussion. I’m pretty libertarian about that. It’s the mislabeling of people who haven’t read something as admirers of that thing. A little Lady Catherine deBourgh-ish, no? So Troot’s characterization of people behaving that way as Janeites is thus inaccurate.

Well, I think that is a semantic point–the group that is perhaps the most interesting case are those Janeites who HAVE read at least 3 of the novels, and who have read at least one of the novels at least 3 times.

Even in that category, my guess is that a majority (or at least a significant minority) are reading Jane Austen as “comfort food” for the soul and heart. They don’t want anything to spoil the good vibe of the unequivocally happy ending for the heroines. So they rationalize the way the JA novels really end, which is, for the most part, equivocally, cryptically, like one of Shakespeare’s problem comedies. Because it feels so good to see the endings as they are depicted in the film adaptations, very romantically.

Those are the folks whom I think (but am not entirely sure) Troost is talking about.

You certainly are entitled to your own guess and your own interpretation of the situation. I’m not entirely sure that a majority of women who have read Austen fail to understand it, as I have no evidence that those who see only a happy ending are a representative sample. Media reports of legions of fluffy-headed people who don’t read Austen right, or tar-hearted middle-aged spinsters (that’s not quite the phrase, is it Mags?) who console themselves with Austen heroes stand a very good chance of being exaggerated. Who’s going to read a story about average people reading and enjoying classic novels and finding new things to think about each time they do?

Are there people who enjoy the novels only at the most surface level and don’t choose to explore further? Yup. Is there anything actually wrong with that? No. Everyone chooses his or her own interpretations. Are they the majority of those who read and re-read Austen? We don’t have any data on that.

Romance novels have an entirely different construction: the whole point of the story is that the relationship between the man and woman (or various undead and/or time-traveling beings)is not only central, but really the whole reason it exists. Their purpose is light entertainment. People read them for fun, not for analysis of the society in which they take place. Austen was truly gifted in combining the two and being pretty damn funny about it at the same time. Various romance writers are touted as the modern Jane Austen, but that’s just marketing. If it moves the product then it’s all good. Are any romance novelists capable of reaching Austen’s heights? I don’t know because that isn’t what they’re trying to do. Some of them are better than others at what they are trying to do, as Austen was more successful than many others at what she was doing. It isn’t hard to tell the difference between romantic fiction and Austen once you’ve opened the cover. If you haven’t opened the cover, you haven’t got a dog in the fight. So perhaps in addition to the mis-identification of casual observers as Janeites, there is a mis-identification by those observers of what it is they are observing.

Also, speaking as a person who has spent more than half her life slumming it in higher education, I’m pretty sure I recognize academic snobbery when I see it. I’ll freely admit that most of us are not Austen scholars, but that doesn’t mean we don’t understand what we’ve read.

Your points are all well taken, Sandra, and as you say, neither of us has any hard data to hold any really reliable opinion about the demographics on these various points.

Apropos your comment about reading the novels at a surface level, versus more deeply, I would also suggest to you that when it comes to Jane Austen, there is deep, and then (thank you, Beth Nielsen Chapman) there is deeper still. If you want to take a walk on the really wild side of Jane Austen, take a peek at my blog.

I take issue with the implication that Austen as “comfort food” is necessarily a bad thing. I’ve been reading Austen since I was 15, and 35 years later it is still “comfort food” for me, but the comfort lies in the entire package–the romantic dance that drives men and women, but mainly, Austen’s sharp and very witty observations of human beings and the constraints that life and society place upon them. I read a lot of books, but when I need a really good read, I always turn to Austen.

I don’t disagree that there are a lot of superficial Austen fans out there who get their fix on pop culture alone. Just as there are a lot of superficial fans of Mrs. Gaskell based on the North & South mini-series and the heavenly RA (I make no apologies for loving him), or fans of Dickens or the Brontës based on viewings of Masterpiece Theater. Popular entertainment is not designed for readers alone (or at all).

But I’m not sure that making grand generalizations on the current state of Janeites based on the blogosphere is advisable or especially accurate. Observations derived from posts on the net are just that, observations of some people who choose to participate in some blogs—which leaves out many millions of Janeites who do not. Moreover, the overall tenor of the various Jane-related blogs varies greatly. Broadly speaking, some clearly draw the more romance-happy crowd and some, a more nuanced bunch; and even then, there are always many individual posters who defy any stereotype. I think making a statement about “most” Janeites based on the net is always fraught with peril.

I also tend to think allowances have to be made for the fact that an individual’s perception of Austen’s novels may deepen with time (and here I am definitely speaking only about those folks actually reading the books). My reading of Austen now is infinitely more interesting and layered than my early reading of Austen. Age and life experience have made me look at the novels through very different lenses over time. I am certain that I am not alone in this. I am not claiming, BTW, that a young reader is incapable of appreciating more than just the romance in Austen, just that plunging into the “deep” end of the pool doesn’t happen at the same point for every reader. Nor, for that matter, is it a requirement for enjoying this or any author.

Though I admit that I sometimes get impatient with the pop-culture generated Austen fans, I confess to having even less patience with Troost’s brand of condescending academic snobbery. Her division of the world into Jane for the scholars and Jane for the masses, and the implication that only the academic is appreciating the “deep” Austen is stuff and nonsense. Austen would have had a field day turning her satiric eye on the prof.

Maria, Let me ask you a question–how much of the scholarly literature about Jane Austen have you read? I ask not to suggest that your reading of Jane Austen is not deep and layered, but because if you have not read any or much of that scholarly literature, you are probably unaware of a few dozen very important topics which bear directly on JA’s writing that would only be known to someone who has read a fair amount of that scholarly literature.

I myself became interested in Jane Austen in 1995, became a Janeite by my definition, above, around 1997, but I only started reading the scholarly literature in early 2005, and I was stunned at what I found out.

Now, the reason I started reading the scholarly literature then was because I realized that my discovery of what I call JA’s “shadow stories” was significant, and I needed to understand what it was that I had discovered. And now that I have read pretty much the entire scholarly literature about JA (which took thousands of hours and a lot of digging), I will be the first to say that the scholars have missed the boat on many fundamental aspects of her writing.

Nonetheless, if you haven’t read all of that stuff, no one, no matter how sharp a reader you may be of JA’s novels themselves, can speak on the same terms as the scholars who have.

Take an analogy to music. A person could naturally have a great ear, and could have listened to tons and tons of great classical music over many years, and could thereby have developed a great sensitivity to nuance in that music. But…that natural, self-taught understanding would not be sufficient for a deeper understanding of classical music, that a musicologist or professional musician would have.

So there is some basis for academic snobbery (and by the way, I am what they call an “independent scholar”, I have done all my research as a private person not connected in any way to an academic institution).

A textbook attempt at thread hijacking, mansplaining, trolling, spamming, attention-whoring, and epic failure to identify a joke. The spam filter was obviously smart enough to catch it, and it will stay there.

Yes, because IT WAS A JOKE. I was excited about the beginning of baseball season and wanted to have a little fun, and I know some of my readers are also baseball fans and would enjoy it and probably would have recognized that IT WAS A JOKE. If you had bothered to follow the link I provided in the post, you would have realized I was aware of all you so kindly offered to explain to me BECAUSE I BLOGGED ABOUT IT IN OCTOBER 2008. But you were too eager to show off and attention-whore, as usual.

And, by the way, I was engaged in a civil, mutually respectful discussion with several women writing in this thread, before you raised the level in the room about ten degrees, I am not sure why you did it.

I have now read all the way through your November 2008 post and I see the link you provided to an article about a book by Julian Norridge which contains the following comment:

“Norridge says the first written evidence of baseball comes from a diary written by William Bray, a teenager from Guildford, Surrey, in 1755”

However, if you read MY link, you will see that Norridge is also incorrect, because I discovered a 1751 POCKET BOOK (i.e., a published book, not a diary) by a fellow named Newbury, which also includes PICTORIAL ILLUSTRATIONS.

So, first, it’s not my error if I respond to your current statement that JA was the first writer (your choice of words), without any qualification. And second, even taking your earlier blog entry into account, my point is still valid.

I’ve written about the earlier book as well, in other blog posts (which were not linked) and I was aware of it well before that. But since the whole thing was purposely outrageous in a joking manner, as evidenced by the tags on the post about “making stuff up” and “kidding around,” not to mention a photomanip of Jane Austen in a Phillies cap for the love of baby Elvis, I didn’t think it was necessary to footnote the bally thing. Apologies if the joke was too subtle for the pointy-headed elves.

As I posted in my own blog on Nov. 23, 2009, the first person to discuss the Newbery description of baseball was a BASEBALL blogger, in 2004. I merely claimed to be the first to realize the significance for Janeites of that 2004 discovery.

You claim you wrote about the Newbery text somewhere else–well, it must have been after you wrote what you wrote in Austenblog in 2008, and I just Googled and can’t find your other blog where you wrote that, so until I see otherwise, I am guided by your own words written the other day that JA was the first writer (without qualification).

Arnie, seriously? You want to get into a mine is bigger than yours argument? Or my Jane is better than yours? I’m so impressed that you have read nearly every bit of Austen scholarship out there. More power to you if that floats your boat. But to humor you, I will answer your question: I have read enough of the “scholarly” material to ocassionally find something interesting and illluminating about Austen, and enough to know there are plenty of blowhards out there willing to parse and/or theorize almost anything to buy themselves a little tenure, a little attention–or a reappointment next semester to teach a class or two. You see, I too worked in academia long enough to recognize a bit of puffed up ego when I see one (Troost), and after earning my degree in English Literature I decided never again to let another academic spoil a good book for me. But since you are so fascinated by my personal reading habits, I will share that I am presently reading “Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England” by Amanda Vickery. I recommend it highly.

My argument remains that you were making huge generalizations about Janeites based on no data other than your own personal interpretation of some of the blogosphere, and that’s a skewered perception hardly worthy of even an independent scholar.

And you really need to pick your side Arnie; on the one hand you claim “that the scholars have missed the boat on many fundamental aspects of her writing” and on the other hand you seem to defend them by saying “there is some basis for academic snobbery.” Careful, you wouldn’t want anyone to class you in among the dull elves.

I am quite comfortable with my own “depth” of perception about Austen and have no need to have that validated by anyone else, not even you. But if Dr. Troost’s ideas of a scholarly and deep understanding of Austen consists of being able to see “the person deeply critical of her own society, the roles of women, the roles of men, the power that money plays over people’s lives, the hypocrisy that lies underneath the – a seemingly polished and elegant world,”–there must be a lot of scholars here on this blog and elsewhere in Austenland. I think many of us have understood that about Austen for a very long time, despite the fact that we are always happy to see Lizzy and Darcy end up together.

And now I am done and move on to more interesting things. I leave you to happily indulge in your scholarly tomes, shadow stories, cryptic clues, and textual bread crumbs. When you find out for certain that Austen was the second gunman in Dallas, do share.

Not really; but thejaneaustenproject has a point as well. Mostly people behave themselves pretty well here, except for the ceremonial Mocking of the Eejit as the situation arises (Not That There’s Anything Wrong With That). So maybe it just seems that way?

Maria, I reckon I will miss you then, when I address JASNA-NYC in 2 weeks about the shadow story of Emma (reprising, in expanded form, the talk I gave at Chawton House in July, 2009), and when I address the JASNA-AGM in October in Portland about the shadow story of Northanger Abbey.

The academic scholars have opened many many doors, and without their collective help, I would not have been able to figure out the full significance of my own discoveries. But I am indeed free from the pressures of teaching and striving for tenure, and I have had a lot of time to spend as I chose, and so I have been free to pursue my ideas where they have led, in ways that is simply not possible for any academic working a full time job. That has been my good fortune, and I have not squandered it.

(and yes, Mags, I do want attention for my ideas, because I am not afraid of a public airing of them–my blog makes no pretense to being one that presents all the current news about Jane Austen–and I will give you your due, you are not censoring these threads, so the way I see it, I am helping you get all the news out there to your subscribers)

Arnie, as the JASNA New York meeting is, to the best of my knowledge, open only to JASNA members and their guests, and because AustenBlog is not affiliated in any way with JASNA and draws its readership from all over the world, and also because I know that the New York region does an excellent job in publicizing their events to their membership and to JASNA members at large, I think it would be inappropriate and perhaps superfluous to post anything about it here, except as an egoboo to you. So there, you have your egoboo, and I hope you are happy with it.

That being said, I had planned a general “check your local JASNA region website for upcoming Spring meetings” type of post later this week, which would have encompassed the meeting at which you are speaking.

As Editrix it is part of my job to make such decisions as to how information should be presented. As always, if you are unsatisfied with your AustenBlog experience, please feel free to discuss it with our Ombudsman.

And Maria, someone reading your response to me would think I had insulted your intelligence and had suggested that you were not a deep reader of JA’s novels.

For clarity, therefore, I now quote exactly what I did write, in which I was very careful to avoid stating or implying EITHER of those things, which would have been insulting:

“…how much of the scholarly literature about Jane Austen have you read? I ask not to suggest that your reading of Jane Austen is not deep and layered, but because if you have not read any or much of that scholarly literature, you are probably unaware of a few dozen very important topics which bear directly on JA’s writing that would only be known to someone who has read a fair amount of that scholarly literature.

I myself became interested in Jane Austen in 1995, became a Janeite by my definition, above, around 1997, but I only started reading the scholarly literature in early 2005, and I was stunned at what I found out.”

So what I was saying is that even deep readers of her novels would benefit greatly from extensive reading in that scholarly literature, so as to become aware of issues and discoveries made over the years which are simply not visible from any reading of the novels alone, no matter how deep and intuitive.

You chose to insult me in a very personal way, when I had merely disagreed with you in a respectful way.

She is a friend and longtime member of JASNA Pittsburgh and a terror when it comes to JA trivia contests and I have never detected in her any disdain for any form of Jane-fandom. As co-editor of Jane Austen in Hollywood as well as other works, she is well aware of the many different ways of appreciating Austen’s works and I feel that she was slightly dis-served by the interpretations of this interview.

My mansion has many rooms as I think someone else said.

I know that I always learn something from a Jane-fan, whether that person has *only* seen the movies or *only* read the books a few times or has burnt the midnight oil in delving into the scholarly tomes, which bear varying varieties of fruit.

Okay–if you vouch for her, Allison, I’ll take your word for it she is one of the Good Guys, then. But she needs to be more careful with this sort of thing. I mean, we all get frustrated with the n00bs sometimes, but sweeping generalizations, when it comes to Jane Austen, are NEVER a good idea.

And on a personal note, I really hate the use of the word “Janeite” as a pejorative.